“I’m sorry, how rude of me. I’m Arthur. Gwendolyn’s fiancé.” The lie flew from my lips, but there was a large part of me that liked that lie. Very much.
I held out a hand for him, and he shook it in shock.
His eyes darted down to her left hand, and I followed his gaze. Crap. Didn’t think that through.
But Gwendolyn did. She’d used her power with some small amount of metal she must have had on her to create a simple band around her finger. I liked that a lot. My girl was smart.
“She deserves all the diamonds in the world but wanted something simple. Who could resist giving her what she wants?” I grinned and then felt a small hand slide itself into mine.
“This is Bradly. He used to work in my department at Griffin Enterprises. We dated for two months, then it ended, and he left to go work for Terratrex Corp. Our competitor.”
The coldness in her voice made me feel like snow had fallen around us. This was probably the woman he dated, the human robot of Seahill, not the one I was pursuing.
“Right. Well, word is spreading about your robots at the hospital. Very sneaky of you to get them to the public right after Terratrex announced their plans. But I came to congratulate you. I knew that was a passion project for you. I wanted to offer you dinner sometime to celebrate, but I see you’re busy.” He looked annoyed that I was there and standing so close.
“Yep. Thanks for stopping by. But we do have plans.” Her face was stoic, and I was willing to do anything to make that mask of ice come off.
“Congratulations again, Gwendolyn. I’ll, uh, see you at the big robotics convention next month.” Bradly didn’t look defeated as he left, just confused. As soon as Gwendolyn closed the door, her hand was out of mine and she started pacing the room, agitated.
“Need to talk about it?”
“I just don’t do well with surprises, and that was not a nice one.” I could tell that immediately, but I didn’t know what to do to help her. So, I asked.
“You could distract me. Help me focus on something else. I’d been planning on doing one thing all day, excited really, then he came by, and it messed me up. Now I feel scattered.” Her hands went to her hair, and I was worried she was about to have another meltdown and pass out.
“Help me cook. I could use a sous chef if you’re up for the job.”
Distraction. That was my job now, helping her focus on something else.
I told her what to do, and then she got to work. She was quiet and seemed a bit tense, so I started talking about Teddy. She loved robots, and he was one of her projects.
“Teddy has been having fun in my warehouse. I even make little messes for him on purpose. He gets frustrated, but I think there’s a part of him that likes it.”
Her shoulders, which were so tight they were trying to touch her ears, lowered a bit. It was working.
“His favorite thing to clean up is wax. I was working on a canvas with wax, and he was having a fit trying to scrape it off the concrete and rug. Soy wax is pretty hard to get off things.”
Since then I have been lighting a candle and dripping a little here and there. It was like a scavenger hunt for him.
I told her as much, and finally she seemed to truly relax again. We worked together to make fajitas and then settled at her table.
“What were you up to today? What’s the response to the robots been like?”
It was easy to take the lead in the conversation, something I felt she appreciated a lot. She chewed on her food and spoke after taking a large gulp of water.
“Everyone seems to like them. Then I came home, had lunch with my friend Lynn, and devised a scheme to seduce you.”
And the water I was drinking went down the wrong tube.
Choking and coughing up my soul, I asked her to repeat what she said through my hoarse voice. She did, and the words didn’t change.
“But Bradly kind of ruined that. Sorry, no seduction tonight.” She lifted her glass of wine and took a sip.
I didn’t even know what to think right now. Taking it slow was my idea, but she was not going to let that happen. There would be no way in hell I would deny this goddess if she truly turned her attention on me and tried to connect with me. Nope, no way in hell. Maybe that made me a bastard, but I didn’t care.
“What are you thinking?” she asked as soon as I regained control of my lungs again.
“I’m thinking you look stunning, and I want you to try again with your plans of seduction.”
Her head tilted to the side, confused by my confession.
“But he ruined my mood and messed up the plan. I was supposed to answer the door. Touch you a bit, talk and connect. Then we would eat, settle in for a movie, and I would try for more. Like kissing and go from there.” She ran through the mental checklist in her head.
“Well, let’s look at this plan. You’ve grabbed my hand. We’ve talked and connected so far. There’s still a lot of checkpoints left that don’t need to be ruined by one drip on the paper, if you will. I’m done eating. Wanna watch that movie you picked?”
I wanted her happy, and if all she wanted to do tonight was watch a movie, then that’s what we would do. But if she wanted more, I’ll be damned if I’m gonna let some prick ruin her night.
She chewed over my words, digesting them and dissecting every angle.
“That’s true. Really, all he did was throw off step one. Everything else has been okay.”
My heart started picking up speed—mostly because it was rushing blood down to my dick.
Images of Gwendolyn under my touch, her lips on mine, our bodies connecting. Yep, I was like one of those drooling dogs at a feast. She didn’t even need to seduce me; I’d knock all this shit off the table and devour her like a buffet.
As soon as we were done eating, we checked off step number five of the seducing Arthur plan: settle on the couch and watch a movie.
Chapter Twenty-One
Gwendolyn
My brain was still buzzing about Bradly coming here, his words, Arthur saying we were engaged, holding hands, and even my stunt with a ring.
I didn’t like surprises, and he messed up everything. But Arthur broke through the crazy in my head and made me realize that Bradly only messed up one step—the rest was still okay. I didn’t feel as beautiful and as confident as before. But I wanted to push past my own head, not letting the Asperger’s rewiring in my head mess up what I wanted. I felt it deep within, this connection with Arthur. It was like a signal between robots. Pops and Cora communicated without words, without my programming. They’d done it all on their own.
That was like us. I didn’t know how to communicate with him like everyone else, but my heart was speaking another language, trusting him and telling me that this was what it wanted. Him. The movie had been on for twenty minutes, and all I’d done was sit next to him.
Making that first move? That I was going to need some help with; nerves and self-confidence issues were beginning to weigh on me. What if I didn’t touch right? What if he didn’t like my body? What if my boobs were too small? What if I was too rigid? Bradly tried to get me to open up to him, but I was so tense. It was why things ended with him. I didn’t like the way he made me feel when he was close, and he thought I was a cold woman. I liked being near Arthur—everything about him felt different.